Bush plans renewed assault on Medicaid

[IndianaGreen]

Amid sweeping cuts in US budget

Bush plans renewed assault on Medicaid

By Joseph Kay
8 February 2005

At the center of the sweeping domestic spending cuts unveiled by the Bush administration Monday is the proposal for a major assault on Medicaid, the main government program that pays for health care for the poor and disabled in the US.

The proposed federal budget calls for cutting $60 billion from projected Medicaid spending over the course of the next decade. Overall, the austerity budget is directed at boosting military spending and extending tax cuts for the rich, while seeking to compensate for the resulting deficit by cutting back or eliminating funding for education, health care and other social programs that aid the most vulnerable layers of society.

Cuts in Medicaid will be one of the main ways that the administration restrains spending on non-discretionary programs, which include Social Security and Medicare. They account for nearly 45 percent of the total amount slated to be squeezed out of these programs.

On February 1, in his first speech since being confirmed as the administration’s new secretary of health and human services, Michael Leavitt described the administration’s planned assault on Medicaid. The new wave of cuts will have a severe impact on many of the 50 million elderly, children, poor and disabled people who depend on Medicaid to pay for needed health care.

http://www.wsws.org/articles/2005/feb2005/medi-f08.shtml

[Spinzonner]

1. The Compassion Overfloweth

[cornermouse]

2. It would appear that a healthy populace is no longer

considered necessary for the well-being of the nation...

[Spinzonner]

3. Just another recruiting inducement

We'll get those social sponges off the dole an on the front lines where they belong.

Then we can screw them with Veterans Benefits too,

And, of course, the 'thinning the herd' value.

[Wright Patman]

5. Sponges are suspect

in terms of sexuality, so the military doesn't want them.

[whathappened]

4. sister was

one of the bull's eye on jr. dart board , we lost her 1 month ago , i blame this gov. and there cuts for her death , she was disabled and never seemed to have enought money to eat and pay for her copay both , to bad just for one day we could'nt put jr. in the shoe's of the one's he are hurting and see how fast he would be crying in his milk about why is my fellow man is not helping him in time of need .